How Deep the Kisses Go

 

How Deep the Kisses Go

(“If I go to the east, God is not there. And if I go to the west, I do not see him there.” Job 23:8)

I could add that I’ve looked up and down to see how deep the kisses go.
It is a long way down, north and south, to insist the address can be found
that got rumpled, unsuited for public view.
Yet here I am
answering the phone again
(and who shall I say is calling this time?)

The voice I am looking for shines with sweat,
the voice I am looking for is too soon for regret,
the voice I am looking for is too old to forget,
and still I find every time I turn to hear,
the clouds muffle its silence again,
(and yet, I have not given up the listening.)

Have you ever found yourself exploring holes and ditches
and then climbed down the sides of a six-foot pit
to discover the dirt slid like gravy and
the walls were too gravity to crawl out the same way
you jumped in? I would not call that a sin,
but you probably yelled the name of
a friend or two to
throw you a rope. Maybe no one came
until well after dinner time.

I could add that I have fallen also,
a child-man scraping his knees,
a curious boy climbing over piles of
cardboard boxes in the garage. I could
make a hideout for days against the walls
and behind my cardboard castle. But I
hid there in bare feet and soon the concrete floor
shot its icy cold through me. I would have walked down
the street on warmer sidewalks but my parents had
asked for an All Points Bulletin for a barefoot boy
on the run.

I could add that, though from hideouts or august asphalt,
it still is a long way down. Maybe what I’ve found is
the kisses surround us deeper than we can ever hope
to mine.